Cold War? What Cold War?

If you’re going to make a stage musical out of a television show, “Happy Days” is not a bad choice. All that cheerful white-bread 1950s innocence. All those instant audience associations with beloved characters and the actors who played them. The show won’t ever win a Pulitzer Prize (or the musical-comedy equivalent), but the Goodspeed Opera House’s bouncy new production delivers a pleasant if not transporting evening, and — most important — the Fonz (Joey Sorge) is cool.

For those unfamiliar with the sitcom, which ran on ABC from 1974 to 1984, here goes: Richie, a clean-cut, aggressively nice Middle American ’50s teenager, lives with his grumpy hardware-store-owner father; his smiling, slightly dazed, kitchen-bound mother; and his annoying kid sister, Joanie. Richie’s perky best pals are Ralph and Potsie.

But just outside the Cunningham house, in an apartment above the garage, lives our real hero, a boarder. Arthur Fonzarelli, a k a Fonzie or the Fonz, rides motorcycles, wears a black leather jacket and can make just about anything happen by snapping his fingers.

Mr. Sorge, who played the Fonz in the original Burbank, Calif., production and at the Paper Mill Playhouse last fall, nails the character’s voice and body language in “Happy Days: A New Musical.” More important, he exudes the character’s amiable self-satisfaction with just a touch of vulnerability.

It’s way too late for the original television actors to come back. Henry Winkler, who played the Fonz, is 62 now, and Ron Howard, who was Richie Cunningham, is a 54-year-old Oscar-winning film director. Tom Bosley and Marion Ross, who played Richie’s parents, are 80 (him) and 79 (her).

The Goodspeed cast member who looks the most like her television counterpart is Savannah Wise, who plays the strong-willed, barely adolescent Joanie. (Just for the record, Erin Moran, the original Joanie, is 47 now.)

“Happy Days” was always criticized for its presentation of the ‘50s as a midcentury paradise, with not even a hint of the era’s troubles, including the cold war, nuclear-annihilation fears and the Communist witch hunts that destroyed careers and lives. But that obliviousness was (or at least became) the point of it all, and the stage version picks up that playful attitude and punches it hard.

Garry Marshall, who created the series, wrote the book, and Paul Williams, the composer (“Rainy Days and Mondays,” “We’ve Only Just Begun”), did the music and lyrics.

Not that there’s any sign of Mr. Williams’s special touch in these ordinary songs. The best of the bunch is Fonzie’s first-act-curtain ballad, “Maybe It’s Time to Move On.”

“Guys Like Us” is also entertaining, at least in principle. It is sung by Fonzie and two imaginary visitors, Elvis (Matt Merchant) and James Dean (Matt Walker). Elvis looks more like Kurt Russell playing Elvis in a TV movie. Dean is dressed properly, in his “Rebel Without a Cause” red jacket, but seems to have borrowed his hair from Edd Byrnes. You know — Kookie, “77 Sunset Strip.”

Michele Lynch’s elating choreography is one of the show’s real assets, but some of the moves recall 1940s jitterbuggers more than 1950s rock ‘n’ rollers. The same is true of David C. Woolard’s costume design, which makes crinolines, short shorts and even kitchen aprons look good, although sometimes a ’40s anachronism pops up, like the girls’ high-heeled pumps with ankle straps. Chachi (Lannon Killea), Fonzie’s cousin, and Joanie’s love interest, wears a bandana tied around his right leg, which I believe means he is a member of the Crips gang.

As for plot, “Happy Days: A New Musical” has one, based (deliberately, I imagine) on the oldest formula in the book: X is going to be closed/torn down, and we all have to band together and save it. In this case it’s Arnold’s, the teenagers’ malt-shop meeting place, threatened with demolition. The solution is a fund-raising event that includes a televised wrestling match.

Yes, the show is as corny as Kansas in August. It is also, on occasion, nicely self-referential, although at the performance I attended, only a few of us seemed to think that was funny. (Comments that ridiculed Canadian accents got much bigger laughs.) Maybe audience members didn’t realize that Richie once had a college-age older brother who mysteriously disappeared after the first season. (Fonzie: “You mean Richie’s brother, Chuck?” Mr. C: “Oh, no. We haven’t heard from him in years.”)

The cast, affectionately directed by Gordon Greenberg, is sweetly appealing, but in solo numbers, some voices aren’t strong enough to be heard over the orchestra; the group numbers are much better.

I can’t tell you much about Rory O’Malley, who plays Richie, because he was unable to perform on the official press opening night. But David Larsen, his affable understudy, could easily be Ron Howard’s son.

The one person associated with the show who hasn’t been replaced is Garry Marshall. So maybe he could answer a question that came to me while watching the Goodspeed production: Did the Hula Hoop and the skateboard ever really co-exist in the good old days?

“Happy Days: A New Musical,” by Garry Marshall and Paul Williams, is at the Goodspeed Opera House, 6 Main Street, East Haddam, through June 29. Information: www.goodspeed.org or (860) 873-8668.